1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to management technologies used for computer equipment, and more particularly to technologies applied effectively to control of a power supply included in multiple computer equipment, which is composed of two or more sets of computer equipment mounted in a case.
2. Description of the Related Arts
A WEB server, an application server, and a database server used for an operation system of a company use computer equipment comprising a processor, a memory, an IO device, and a storage device. In recent years, multiple computer equipment has been coming into wider use in order to achieve space saving computer equipment and to place, at one location, servers included in a system so as to manage the servers in an integrated manner. A blade server is well known as multiple computer equipment. This blade server is configured such that components of computer equipment, such as a CPU, a memory, and an HDD, are placed in a thin case called a CPU module or a CPU blade and the plurality of CPU modules are placed in a case called a chassis or an enclosure. Thus, high-density multiple computer equipment is realized. As a result, further space saving can be achieved as compared with the conventional computer equipment. In addition, the blade server is equipped with AC-DC power supply modules for supplying the electric power to the components of the computer equipment in the chassis. In general, the blade server is equipped with a plurality of AC-DC power supply modules so that multiple computer equipment can continue operating even if a failure occurs in one of the AC-DC power supply modules. With the objective of achieving the integrated management of the two or more sets of computer equipment as described above, the blade server is in general equipped with a management module for controlling and managing modules constituting the computer equipment, such as a CPU module, and the AC-DC power supply modules, located in the chassis. The management module performs: for example, ON/OFF control of the power supply to the modules including the CPU module and the AC-DC power supply modules; monitoring of the temperature in the CPU module and the temperature in the chassis; and fault monitoring and fault handling of the modules including the CPU module and the AC-DC power supply modules. An administrator of the blade server is allowed to access this management module by means of, for example, telnet, and thereby to control ON/OFF of the power supply of the computer equipment in the blade server. Further, in order to manage a system including an operation system and an application operating on computer equipment, management software that operates on computer equipment, i.e., a management server located outside the blade server is used. This management server is connected to the management module described above through a management network, for example, through a local area network (LAN). By communicating with the management module, the management server can control ON/OFF of the power supply of the computer equipment in the blade server. Moreover, this management server is connected to individual computer equipment included in the blade server through the management network, and manages an operation system, applications, and the like, which operate on the computer equipment. Here, agent software which operates on the computer equipment is in general used for communications between the management software and the computer equipment.
Incidentally, this kind of blade server is described in Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2002-32153 (“Cartridge type server unit, and case for housing the server unit”).